Mix Tape
by Imaginari-Mari
Summary: If music be the food of love, play on. William Shakespeare . iPod challenge: put your iPod on shuffle, and use the first 10 songs to tell the story of the relationship between two characters.


**Mix Tape**

**iPod challenge:**

Directions

1. Pick a character, pairing, or fandom you like.

2. Turn on your music player and put it on random/shuffle.

3. Write a drabble related to each song that plays. You only have the time frame of the song to finish the drabble; you start when the song starts, and stop when it's over. No lingering afterwards!

4. Do ten of these, then post them.

**Pairing:** Harry/Hermione

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**(1) "A Girl Worth Fighting For"- Mulan**

Hermione has always been the one worth fighting for. She has always supported me; she's never back down from the fight, and always remained loyal. She worries about me excessively, but it's because she cares.

I _know_ it is.

She's got a brain, and always speaks her mind; she's not fooled by overly showy displays of masculinity. She has an adorable smile that you can only catch on her face when a book is in her hands.

She's the girl I want to make the world better for; I want Voldemort dead so that she can finally live in a world without fear.

Luckily, it's my job to kill him.

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**(2) "We Are Broken"- Paramore**

He's gone.

He's left me and Harry, alone in this godforsaken tent in the Forest of Dean, the cold of winter pressing all around us and sucking the happiness out of each of us.

But it affected Ron most of all. The dementors made him think so many terrible things that he confided in me that I could never, ever tell Harry. He was so jealous- and it makes me wonder if Ron really ever felt friendship for Harry at all, if he could walk out on him during the most important time in Harry's life.

Harry walks back into the tent one ngiht after scouting, and finds me curled up in an armchair, sobbing quietly because I cannot – _cannot_ – believe it has come to this.

"Hermione?" he questions, running over to the chair. I can only look at him; I'm sobbing hard enough hat no words can come out.

He wordlessly grabs me into an hug, determined to protect me from myself. His arms are like towers, strong and sturdy, unwavering. I relax into him, feeling better than I have in months, and my arm slips around his waist. Harry is so lost and alone. But I will be there for him. I always am.

I always will be.

"Are you feeling better, 'Mione?" he whispers into my hair, feeling me start to relax and kissing the top of my head.

"I just want to be whole."

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**(3) "Sittin' at a Bar" – Rehab**

Ron sat at the bar in the Leaky Cauldron, hi hand wrapped around a glass of Old Ogden's. Tom looked over at him sympathetically as he cleaned the glasses.

"You haven't said a word all night, Mr. Weasley. What's troubling?"

Ron shook his head, staring into the glass as if he was hoping he could drown himself in it. He tossed it back, then looked at the bartender.

"Hermione kicked me out."

Tom's eyes widened. The entirety of the Wizarding world followed the lives of the Golden Trio after the Second War; everyone expected Harry to marry Ginny, but instead he remained unattached, leaving the public eye focused on Hermione and Ron.

In Tom's opinion, they were only dating as a matter of expectation. Hermione and Harry had always seemed more perfect for each other, even though Tom only observed them whenever they stepped in before heading to Diagon Alley. They looked so much in love, so in tune with each other.

If a bartender could see that, why couldn't anyone else?

"What happened, Ron?"

"Hermione caught me cheating on her. I'm sure she's fine; she ran straight to Harry as soon as she threw all of my shit onto the lawn." His voice was bitter.

Tom nodded sympathetically, clapped Ron on the shoulder, and took up cleaning his glasses again. Internally, however, he was smiling.

Now things could work the way they were really supposed to.

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**(4) "Clean Break" – Axium**

Hermione was sitting on the couch in Harry's living room, a glass of wine in her hand. Harry was puttering around in the kitchen making dinner, determined to make her feel better. Ron has officially moved out today, and he knew that his best friend was suffering, no matter how stoic she seemed.

He left the chicken in the oven and walked into the living room, then sat next to her on the couch, slipping an arm around her shoulders. She instinctively snuggled close against him.

They were silent for a few minutes, then she spoke up.

"This clean break is better."

He looked at her, a question in his eyes. She noticed, and pulled back slightly, making a connection between her brown eyes and his green.

"Harry, you know it's better not to linger on this. Yes, he cheated on m. Yes, I'm upset about it. But I don't love him like I used to. I don't think I ever really loved him enough to make his cheating on me something that will destroy my life. So this clean break from that relationship – if you could call it that- is best for all of us. I'm not getting back together with him."

Harry nodded, slowly comprehending her logic. "If that's what you want, Hermione, I am here for you.

She smiled. "Plus, now I can try to get together with the one I really love, guilt free."

He choked. "What? Who?!"

Hermione chuckled. "You'll see."

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**(5) "Cold (But I'm Still Here)" by Evans Blue**

Harry took a drag on his cigarette outside of the ministry of magic. It was a habit he had recently started in a way to deal with the stress of being an Auror- and right now, it was particularly stressful. A dark wizard was gaining strength and proving nearly impossible to capture, and his partner just happened to be the prat who cheated on the only person he considered his best friend anymore.

Ron was always trying to get info about Hermione from Harry- but Harry refused to give it, pissing Ron off to no end.

"Who are you loyal to, Harry?" he had asked. Harry only looked at him. There was no need to explain how Ron was always leaving Harry. Harry felt no obligation to help him.

He shivered in the cold; it was far too nippy to be out here without a jacket, but he had needed an escape.

As he shivered, he felt a coat wrap around his shoulders. He turned around, and found Hermione standing on her tiptoes, having had to reach up to put the coat on him.

Without speaking, she tore the cigarette from his mouth and stomped it into the ground

"I figured you'd be out here. Don't brood so much, Harry. It'll be okay."

"I'm just worried about you. You know you're the only thing I care about right now."

She remained on her toes and kissed his cheek, her lips lingering longer than they should have.

"I know."

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**(6) "Going Under" by Evanescence. **

On her bed, she had pictures strewn out. In every single one was the same group of three people: a bushy-haired girl, a ginger-haired boy, and a black-haired boy who's shoulders were already weighed down with the burdens of a man.

God, how Hermione missed the days when they were together, the three of them, before their lives went to shit. _This isn't how it was supposed to turn out._

Harry came back to his and his roommate's apartment and found her on her bed, crying soundlessly while staring at the pictures. She did this every couple of weeks, when nostalgia took over her.

"If only Ron knew how many tears you'd cried for him," he said while standing in her doorway. He mad his way over to her bed, and sat down next to her.  
Maybe then he wouldn't be such as ass."

She shook her head. "It isn't, Ron, Harry. You know that. I just want things to be the way they were. With all of us as friends."

"Just friends?"

She glared at him. 'I already told you, Harry, it's not-"

"Not, Ron. I know. But do you want our relationship to remain 'just friends'?"

Hermione blinked at him; her heart was fighting with her mind, the words she wanted to say trying to break free. She managed to blurt out the first thing that popped into her head.

"I love you."

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**(7) "Build God, Then We'll Talk" by Panic at the Disco**

"You're living in sin!" Mrs. Weasley yelled, her eyes flashing at the two people her son used to call his best friends. She had forgiven Harry for failing to marry Ginny like everyone had planned, but she could not forgive these two for getting together and ruining the life her baby boy was supposed to have.

Hermione looked nervously at Harry. Mrs. Weasley was always a mother figure to him; she half-expected her boyfriend to turn to her any second and tell her it was over, once again finding favor in the clan of redheads dominated by this overbearing matriarch.

"Forgive me, Mrs. Weasley," Harry began. "but do not try to preach a moral code to me when Percy and Aubrey are humping their brains out in the room upstairs, with your blessing."

The older woman spluttered, and Harry took this opportunity to grab Hermione's arm and apparate away. When they reached their apartment, she grabbed him into a long kiss that left them both breathless and wanting more.

She wasn't going to doubt his loyalty to her again.

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**(8) "Golden" – Fall Out Boy**

The ring in the box in his suit jacket pocket was gold. Golden.

The lights shining down on Hermione's hair was gold. Golden.

But he couldn't help the nerves churning and swirling in his stomach, making this dinner date more and more like torture than it should have been. But dessert would come soon, and he'd be down on one knee in front of this beautiful woman who always stood by him, no matter what. He knew he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her.

He hoped she'd accept.

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**(9) "Dance With My Father" – Luther Vandross**

Hermione swayed on the dance floor, her white gown brushing against the hardwood. Her father's hand was around her waist, and he had a smile on his joy-filled faced.

"'Mione," he began, his eyes filling with happy tears as he looked at his only child- his beautiful baby girl. "I am so proud of you."

She buried her head into her father's shoulder, her veil covering his face. "I know, Daddy."

"If there's one man I would willing give you up to, it's Harry Potter."

His daughter smiled. "But you'll always be my father."

He nodded. "Always."

Two weeks later, right after their honeymoon, her eyes were filling with tears while she clutched her new husband to her. Her father had a heart attack, and was in a coma. He might never wake up.

What she wouldn't give to dance with him again.

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**(10) "Disarray" by Lifehouse**

Harry was not in a good mood.

There were papers strewn all over his home office, some of them ripped and others of them drooled on. Obviously, he had forgotten to shut the door all the way, and his two year-old son James had managed to turn his father's study into his private playground.

Hermione poked her head into the room, the gurgling toddler in her arms.

"Anything salvageable?"

Her husband shook his head, surveying the damage. "I don't think my office can take another baby."

Hermione giggled, quite out of character for her. "Oops."


End file.
